


The Root of Evil

by FortuneSurfer



Category: Hannibal (TV), Hannibal Lecter (Hopkins Movies), Hannibal Lecter Series - All Media Types, Hannibal Lecter Tetralogy - Thomas Harris
Genre: BAMF Clarice Starling, Book: The Silence of the Lambs (1988), Cooperation, Crossover, Gen, Interview, Living in Florida, Mixed Canon, Movie: The Silence of the Lambs (1991), Silence of the Lambs References, Will is a Mess, visit
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-08
Updated: 2018-07-08
Packaged: 2019-05-29 00:02:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 909
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15060674
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FortuneSurfer/pseuds/FortuneSurfer
Summary: Clarice needs advice. Will has a lesson to teach her.





	The Root of Evil

**Author's Note:**

> Achtung: not beta read.

Traces of all the stories lead to Florida, where cutter boats and sailing ships lazily furrow the waving coastal waters, in the boundless, piercingly bright sky echo the cries of terns, and at sunset a part of you wishes to die here and nowhere else.

A teenager on a skateboard shows a V-sign to her Fort Mustang, which is following the streets with the short palm trees on every corner only to find – half a kilometer from the coast, a block from a fishing tackle shop – the man who once was able to rewind time as easily as unwind a fishing line in a spool.

The driveway of his house is stained with the shaggy shadows of the wanton plants, the pattern on the tile of the porch has effaced.

Will Graham greets her with a disfigured face you aren’t supposed to stare at, and averting her eyes Clarice realizes why even when Jack Crawford smiles his eyes stay dead.

She shows him her credentials and lists all the states: Missouri, Ohio, Kentucky, Indiana, Illinois. Each of the places in which over the course of the last ten months they have fished skinned women with their faces eaten off by fish and turtles out of the polluted rivers.

Then, she lists the names of all the people she has interviewed so far: Doctor Du Maurier, Doctor Chilton, Doctor Bloom, who now lives with her wife and son in Switzerland. Agent Miriam Lass. Fredricka “Freddie” Lounds.

When the corner of his mouth twitches in disgust after the last one, Clarice grasps at it and adds:  
“You may not believe this, but she was talking about you with respect.”  
“Ramblings about me made her a lot of money.”

The scars of Will Graham look directly at her.

“Where I come from people do not ask for favors or press for friendship,” starts Clarice.  
“How much time do you have?” cuts her off Graham, sparing them the formal part.  
“Till Saturday evening.”  
“So, you put yourself under pressure.”  
“I prefer to be well-informed before making any relevant steps. And you happen to be my last stop, Agent Graham.”  
“Never have been an agent.”  
“Still, you have been and continue to remain a legend of the FBI Academy and the BAU and despite all the effort will never become just a drunk mechanic, even if your liver already resembles an old tennis ball. Sir.”  
“You came here to be taught how to be interesting to him. I can’t teach you that,” says Graham, and Clarice hates him.

Hates him because he destroyed his mind, an inestimable sophisticated tool, flooded it with cheap booze to stop the famous pendulum.

“You willingly gave up your life. These women didn’t,” suddenly, there is a metallic rasp in her voice. “Once, it had meant something to you.”

***

The thunderclap behind the rattling windows is so loud, as if the sky cracked and broke. Clarice looks behind the curtain, but there is nothing, only howling void. They’ll be cut off the world for the next couple of hours.

Will makes a fire in the fireplace, his strays gather around the only source of light and warmth in the deenergized house. Small patches of light cosily dance on the wooden beams under the ceiling.

“If he’ll talk to me, I just need straight reporting. If he won’t, I have to tell how does he look, how does his cell look, what's he doing.”  
“Local color.”  
“You could say so.”

Taste of the orange lemonade reminds Clarice of Ardelia. The glass of her glass optically tightens the flame in the fireplace.  
“Maybe Crawford hopes that I’ll entertain him. He had fewer visitors since Buffalo Bill has been around. Less mail.”

Graham asks her:  
“How do you see Hannibal Lecter?” and Clarice tries to imagine what kind of professor Graham was.  
“I know that he is an exceptionally destructive person, who he has been diagnosed with half of the mental disorders from the DSM. It seems that nobody can say anything with certainty. Except for you.”  
“Evil isn’t the same as destructive. You wouldn’t say that storms or hail are evil?”

For a second, Clarice believes that Graham’s stare hums, but in reality, of course, it’s the sound of her own blood circulation in her ears.

“You want to get into the behavioral science unit at any cost, because you need to work with the sickest criminals to understand the nature of evil. To rationalize it. You want to dig up the root of it, because you believe that you out of all won’t be tempted to take a bite,” monologs Graham, and Clarice feels suddenly weak, as though she had given blood. “And maybe you won’t. But there is no reason behind Hannibal Lecter’s actions, apart from his own amusement and curiosity. Nothing happened to him. He happened. Do not reduce him to the sum of influences. And be very careful: he’ll try to find out about you. It's the kind of curiosity that makes a snake look in a bird’s nest. Do not give him any access to any of your personal facts.”

He pauses.

“I’m praying that he’ll think you are a low-key hick, but I can already tell that it’s not going to happen… You are far from being ordinary, Agent Starling,” Will Graham tells her with an ugly smile. “But would you believe me if I told you that there is nothing good about being special?”


End file.
